than 30,000 votes. itwasrazortight. republicansexpected to take indiana back this year. we'll see if they do that, if they do that and what sort of margin. the big one here at 7:00, is virginia. 13 electoral votes. at 7:01 eastern time, literally, 22 minutes and 30 some odd seconds from now you will see various counties and cities in virginia start to fill in. red is republican. blue is democrat. we'll start to get an idea how virginia is shaping up tonight. from the bill/bret board. back to you. >> megyn: bill hemmer at billboard. charles krauthammer coming up in a minute. we have this. >> bret: with the miracle of videotape, i will give you a tour of the fox facilities, really all of them but we start in studio "j," our home base for the evening. this big board is called the launch pad. we have a lot of information on the board throughout the night. you will see in the corner the balance of power, the u.s. senate and u.s. house. we'll have foxnews.com, info. the next poll closings. how close we are to that. over here, a big map about all of the states as they close. you will see

everything inarazortightrace.the government reports america's unemployment rate rising in the month of october to 7.9%. 171,000 jobs added last month. that is far fewer than the 250,000 many economists say are needed each month to turn the economy around. so that is the big number we have. that's where we start. good morning. i'm bill hemmer. welcome here. morning, martha. martha: good morning bill. what a week. it is friday. welcome everybody, i'm martha maccallum. this jobs report today could be the freshest things people have in their mind in terms of a economic number when they head to the polls in a few days. this short shows it has been a very slow, sluggish recovery. the government reports real unemployment, this is the number we want to focus on, 14.6%. we say that for a good reason. that includes people that are underemployed, even people only worked one day, get counted in the underemployed, part time emed employed. some just have given up. bill: stuart varney, anchor fox business network. good morning to you. start with the more significant number you find there. what is

worn out the mute button on my own television. itisrazortightraceright now. both sides are claiming they have the edge. i talked with ohio senator robb portman, a republican, leading surrogate for the romney team. about how things are shaping up for governor romney eight days away. senator portman, good morning. >> good to be with you again. bill: on sunday you said we're about dead-even in ohio. that would mean governor romney is trailing. is that the case in this state today? >> no. i think it is a sty right now and i think momentum is on our side. in the polling before the debates we were down five or 10 points and we've had a steady movement our way ever since. poll came out on sunday i was referencing showed the race to be dead-even, tied at 49-49. that same poll only a few weeks ago showed us five points down. energy and enthusiasm is on our side. our folks are work harder than ever. grass-roots movement is harder than ever and momentum in is our direction which you always like. bill: in 2004 president bush beat senator kerry by 118,000 votes? is that the model fo